Family members and close friends mourn and pray during a special memorial service for Dylan Nuno at Parkway Life Church in East Naples on Jan. 26, 2011. Nuno, a Palmetto Ridge High School student, was killed during a fight with Jorge Saavedra, which started after they got off the bus on Monday at 47th Avenue NE in Golden Gate. Greg Kahn/Staff

Jorge Saavedra

GOLDEN GATE - They came to cry.

They came to reflect.

They came for hope, and they came for forgiveness.

They came from Lely and Naples, Golden Gate and Palmetto Ridge high schools – all to remember 16-year-old Dylan Nuno, a friend who was killed tragically during a fight after exiting his school bus on Monday afternoon.

Two days after the Palmetto Ridge sophomore was killed, more than 400 people — mostly Collier County teenagers — packed into the Parkway Life Church, 5975 Golden Gate Parkway, on Wednesday night for a memorial service.

"I don't know what's going on inside your heart. I don't know what's going on inside your mind. But I know there is a lot of confusion," Chris Pascale, the church's student pastor, told the standing room-only crowd. "Does it have to take something like this for God to use you to bring you together?"

Wednesday's service was more than just a memorial for Nuno. It was also an opportunity for the teens to pray for 14-year-old Jorge Saavedra, the Palmetto Ridge freshman accused of stabbing Nuno during the altercation.

He is being held in juvenile detention for three weeks prior to his arraignment.

Sam Aleman, 17, a junior at Gulf Coast High School who has been friends with Nuno since moving to Collier County as a 4-year-old, said Saavedra's family needs help as well. Most in attendance Wednesday seemed to be there for Nuno, but Aleman hoped they could eventually forgive Saavedra.

"Let's hope so. They probably don't want to," he said. "But we've got to do what we've got to do. There's nothing we can do about it. It's done."

During the hour-long service, quiet keyboard music played as Pascale urged the teens to celebrate Nuno's life, to offer their lives to God, and to make good choices.

"The choices that were made this week were tragic," he said.

Pascale first invited Nuno's cousin and girlfriend to the front of the church for prayer. The pews emptied when he invited any friends of Nuno who needed prayer to come forward as well. Church officials passed out tissues throughout the emotional service.

The evening ended with a candlelight vigil outside the church.

"We pray for everyone that is going through this," Pascale said, "because we are one community."

Sean Meeks, 17, a Naples High School student who has known Nuno since he was 5 years old, stood with friends outside the church prior to the candle lighting.

"It meant a lot," Meeks said of the service. "I'm emotionally exhausted ... so many thoughts running through my head; memories."

Wednesday's "illumination" youth service usually draws about 150 teens, most of whom come from families that don't typically attend church, Pascale said.

After Monday's stabbing, Pascale said, some of his members asked about hosting a memorial to pray for the Nuno and Saavedra families.

Things just snowballed from there.

"Some of the students started to text each other. Then they created Facebook pages for the service, inviting all their friends," Pascale said.

Friends and officials are still trying to determine what, exactly, led to Monday's fight between Nuno and Saavedra.

Some people on the bus said Saavedra had been bullied, and was pushed to his limits Monday. Others said Nuno and Saavedra had differences over "petty stuff."

Collier County Sheriff's Office arrest reports and incident reports indicate that Nuno delivered the first blows. Few witnesses, if any, knew that Saavedra was armed.

Collier dispatchers received the first 911 call about the stabbing at 2:28 p.m., and the first paramedics arrived at the scene at 2:34 p.m., Collier EMS Deputy Chief Dan Bowman said Wednesday.

Nuno was transported to NCH North Naples Hospital via ground ambulance, where he was pronounced dead. He wasn't transported to Lee Memorial Hospital in Fort Myers via air ambulance, because by the time medics arrived, he was already in trauma arrest – his heart had stopped.

"It is our policy not to transport trauma arrests in the helicopter," Bowman said. "There are many reasons, with the configuration of the helicopter, that make it difficult if not dangerous."

Nuno would have celebrated his 17th birthday Friday.

An official visitation for Nuno is slated for 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday at Fuller Funeral Home, 4735 U.S. 41 East, according to the funeral home. Funeral services are private.